Lea Godfrey -Blog on Hawaiian Dance

We learned, or attempted to learn the hula dance. It was a lot more intricate than I imagined. When I finally got a few steps down, our hula instructor threw in some hand gestures too. If that wasn't enough, we also had to chant simultaneously with our dance. It was humorous watching my lack of dance skills in the mirror along with the others that struggled. We were ordered to remove all footwear before entering the dance studio unless someone
happened to be walking around in dance footwear. My bare feet were disgustingly filthy by the end of our dance escapades. After dancing, we popped a squat on the floor and got instruments that looked like maracas with a feathery top that resembled a flower. We learned a few different
rhythms with the instruments, which involved shaking them as
well as hitting them against our legs and palms. It was also interesting to find out about the history of the hula and how at one time the hula was banned, and this lasted for many decades. The only way hula got passed on during that time was through private practices.

It was neat that the hula dance portrayed some of the stories of their culture that they had orally passed on. The hula helped Hawaiians to later document these stories, which could have been forgotten. Overall Auntie Vicki's lecture was fun and I learned a lot. I am having a lot of fun in Hawaii and I can not wait to learn more as our stay in Hawaii is slowly winding down.

Lea